Minister Barrett to Secretary Root. No. 66.] AMERICAN LEGATION, SIR: Referring to my No. 64 of April 2, 1906, I have the honor to report further developments as follows:1 As a result of the conference I held with the President, in which we discussed in a full, frank, and friendly way the relations of Colombia and the United States, and after he had seen the report in the American papers that Colombia was displeased with your reply to Minister Mendoza's note and might therefore break off relations with the United States, he decided to telegraph explicit instructions to Minister Mendoza to the effect that he should in no way appear disturbed over your answer to his note, but that, on the other hand, he should continue to discuss matters with you in a friendly way, in the hope of promoting an amicable understanding between the two countries. The President further said that he desired Dr. Mendoza to make the same efforts in Washington that I am making in Bogota to develop the best of relations. In view of the importance of this action of the President and of the possibility that erroneous reports might be published in the States, I deemed it best to include references to this in my telegram confirmed in an unnumbered dispatch of this same date. I have the honor, etc., Confidential.] Minister Barrett to Secretary Root. JOHN BARRETT. AMERICAN LEGATION, SIR: I have the honor to submit to you a confidential report of an informal discussion enjoyed between President Reyes and myself which has a most important bearing on the relations of the United States and Colombia and indirectly on the coming Pan American conference. As you are aware from previous dispatches of mine, it has been my well-defined policy here not to urge in any way the recognition of Panama by Colombia or to appear insistent on reaching any understanding with the United States as to the questions which Colombia holds are outstanding and unsettled. On the other hand I have endeavored to employ officially and personally every ligitimate and dignified means to soften the bitter feeling aroused against the United States and President Roosevelt by the Panama incident and to develop a friendlier attitude toward our Government and President. If a just conclusion can be drawn from the treatment of myself as American minister by the Colombian Government, people, and press, it would seem as if my efforts were reciprocated and appreciated, and good results in consequence were being accomplished. Such feeling, however, has not crystallized into a tangible specific diplomatic step in the desired direction until to-day, Wednesday, 1 Not printed. Merely incloses newspaper clipping. May 23, when the President invited me to spend the day with him informally at Madrid, his country residence. I am writing this dispatch immediately after my return on the evening train to Bogota, when all that was said is fresh in my mind. Soon after my arrival at his house, the President invited me into his private office with Dr. Climaco Calderon, his minister of foreign affairs, and remarked in effect as follows: Mr. Minister, I am talking with you now not so much as President Reyes but as your old friend Reyes of the second Pan American conference. I desire to speak frankly with you as one in whom I have complete confidence and whom I believe to be a sincere friend of mine and Colombia, while a loyal minister of the United States. Then, too, you know that, despite the Panama affair, I have always been a supporter and admirer of the United States and President Roosevelt, and that, for instance, at the second Pan American conference in Mexico, I invariably acted in harmony with you and your colleagues from the United States. Now He continued I want to read to you a confidential memorandum that has been submitted to me by one of our prominent and able citizens in regard to the relations of the United States, Colombia, and Panama, and to learn what you think of it. In the main it expresses my views as far as proposed policy is concerned with such modifications as are self-evidently necessary. He then read the memorandum, a translation of which made by his orders, I attach hereto in the exact language of the form handed me, and I would earnestly recommend that you read it at this point before proceeding to consider what I have hereinafter written. When the President had concluded the reading of the memorandum, he made the following observations: It is true, as the memorandum says, that a movement has been started in Cauca, Antioquia, and the Atlantic Provinces, in harmony with some agencies and influences in Panama, to form a new republic including Panama, and to make Panama City the capital. The failure of Mr. Mendoza to accomplish anything for the benefit of Colombia has given strength to the movement, and the story has been circulated that the United States will not only quietly aid such a plan, but gladly recognize the new republic. This report has even gone to Chile, Argentina, and Brazil and secured sufficient official credence there to cause our minister to these countries, Gen. Uribe-Uribe, to telegraph me concerning it and inform me that some of the delegates of these countries to the Rio conference might refer to it as evidence that the United States was secretly preparing to repeat the Panama incident and add to its hold on South America. I now wish to wire him not only that the United States is not abetting such a movement, but has given me assurance of an eventual settlement of our differences-and so frustrate the enemies of the United States. I am speaking frankly, as you know, when I tell you that strong influence has been brought to bear on me from other countries of South America to oppose the United States at the Pan-American conference and even not to send delegates, but I have refused, as you are well aware, to listen to such suggestions, believing in the high purpose of President Roosevelt and Secretary Root and the justice of the United States in its final attitude toward Colombia. I am reliably informed that there are men at work in Panama beyond my reach to assist a revolution in Cuaca and Cartagena, looking to union with Panama, and I wish you would kindly ask Mr. Root to instruct Minister and Governor Magoon to watch any schemes or schemers of this kind and use his influence against it. Such a movement can not succeed without a long and bloody war, for, if necessary, I should take the field and command myself, while, as it is, I know that I am in control of the situation and can prevent any outbreak if the United States does not intervene against me. I shall be grateful if you will cable your Government an outline of my suggestions, together with a request that its representative in Panama watch the situation there in reference to Cauca, etc., and then confirm your message with a full report of our meeting and conversation. I then took up the conversation for a few minutes, and said in effect the following: Without committing my Government in any way, I thank you for your frankness in reading and discussing this memorandum. I will forward it in a confidential dispatch, as you desire, to Secretary Root, and await his instructions. Referring to the comments you have just made, I would say first, that I will, of course, treat its suggestions as confidential and ask my Government to so treat it. As to the withdrawal of Mr. Mendoza, it would seem better to me to postpone such action for the present or until any negotiations might be actually begun, for fear that his recall might be misinterpreted as Colombian displeasure with the United States or as a break off of relations just before the Pan-American conference, when signs of good will were desirable on all sides. As to the formation of a new republic, I need hardly assure you that the United States has not lent and will not lend the least shadow of assistance to any arrangement of the kind described by you, and, if it is asserted that the United States is secretly favoring its consummation, such allegation is the pure fabrication of its enemies. I am aware of the anti-American influences brought to bear on you in connection with the Pan American conference, and I have also informed my Government that you not only were not moved by them, but that Colombia's delegates at Rio would not embarrass the United States by any discussion of the Panama question. I shall telegraph my Government the substance of your suggestions as expressed in this memorandum and the recommendation that Minister Magoon keep an eye on any revolutionary or new republic movement in Panama. In regard to the transfer of negotiations from Washington to Bogota, suggested in the memorandum, I must state that, while I appreciate deeply the compliment to myself I can not personally advise or request my Government to approve of such a step. It might seem better in its opinion to conduct any actual negotiations in Washington where my Government is always in close touch with Panama and where the approval of the Senate is required to any treaty, but, as you do not insist on negotiations being conducted here, that is a point that can be easily arranged later on. At this point I called attention to the fact that, as you would be leaving the United States early in July for the Rio conference and a visit to South America and not be returning before September or October, my Government, if disposed to act on these new suggestions of Colombia, could not take up their careful consideration before fall. Gen. Reyes replied that he understood that situation and would not expect anything explicit to be accomplished until after your return, but he did hope, for reasons stated above and in the memorandum, that the United States Government would give him some direct assurance of willingness to undertake negotiations along these general lines before the Pan American conference meets simply answered that I would confirm my telegram with this extended and detailed report which should reach Washington in the latter part of June, and it might be possible to receive some definite word, although I could not promise it, before your departure. I President Reyes then enlarged upon the hope that you and the President would think favorably of his proposals. He said: (a) That you could not realize how strong still was the feeling, amounting almost to intense hatred, among the people of Colombia against the United States on account of its standing by Panama in the latter's separation; (b) that only by his constant watchfulness and personal good will to the United States for three years, followed now by my friendly attitude, had outbreaks against Americans and American property been prevented; (c) that this feeling had been recently revived by those agitators, politicians, and priests, who insisted on making capital out of your reply to Minister Mendoza's notes: () that in Antioquia, Cauca, and the Atlantic Provinces, it had developed in another form into a movement, as already described, for a new republic, until credence was given the report of the secret assistance of the United States, not only in the other parts of Colombia, but in other nations of South America; (e) that Colombia, if peace could be preserved, was about to enter upon a period of great material and commercial development that would be of the highest value and importance to the export and financial interests of the United States; (f) that European trade and money interests recognized the situation and were doing all in their power to get a firm hold on the commercial and material opportunities of Colombia and (g) that, finally, in a practical desire to obtain results and inaugurate a new era in the foreign relations of Colombia, he now gave up all hope of arbitration or indemnity being conceded by the United States-so dear to the expectations of the Colombian people-and proposed the negotiation of new treaties on a basis that the United States, in view of all that Colombia had suffered and lost. must admit was fair and equitable. Therefore he hoped that you and the President would most carefully consider his intimations and thus open the way to the complete restoration of cordial relations between the United States and Colombia. to the recognition of Panama by Colombia, and to the establishment of permanent accord between the latter nations by means of a treaty of friendship and commerce. In order to have a perfectly clear understanding in general terms of what he proposed, I then asked the President to summarize them, apart from the memorandum, which he did, as follows: 1. Colombia desires to negotiate a new treaty of friendship and commerce with the United States (to supersede the treaty of 1846), in which, in view of Colombia's former sovereignty and vital interests at stake, the United States shall grant to Colombia the same general privileges in the canal and Canal Zone as provided by the Hay-Herran treaty, as they affect trade, commercial intercourse, shipping, or practically the same as now granted to Panama in these respects. 2. Colombia will recognize Panama as an independent Republic within the limits of the old department of Panama (which is now conceded to be the pres ent extent of Panama), and negotiate with Panama a treaty of friendship and commerce, provided Panama will assume a part of Colombia's foreign debt, contracted before the separation of Panama, in proportion not only to population, but to resources and wealth. 3. The United States will use its good offices and its peculiar relation of responsibility to Panama to intervene with that Government and make sure that Panama will treat with Colombia in good faith and do its share and part in arranging a basis of settlement of the foreign-debt question. 4. Prior to the negotiation of the Colombia-Panama treaty, Colombia will arrange privately with the United States, and the latter with Panama, that Panama shall send a confidential representative to Bogota to consider and sign a protocol, before being officially received as minister plenipotentiary, covering the questions to be settled in a formal treaty that will be negotiated immediately after the protocol is signed. 5. The United States Government will give, if possible, an assurance before the Pan American conference of its willingness to undertake negotiations along these lines in order to prevent any expression of feeling there against the United States, and to thwart any plans for the formation of an interoceanic republic, which would include Panama and the Colombian territory of Cauca, Antioquia, and the Atlantic provinces, thus doing Colombia a great service and strengthening the position of the United States not only in Colombia, but in all South America. 6. The actual negotiations will await the return to Washington of Secretary Root from his trip to South America, and be conducted in the late fall or early part of next year, when the Congresses of both the United States and Colombia will be in session and can consider and ratify the treaties. Although conditions favor Bogota, it is not material whether the actual negotiations take place in Bogota or Washington, but, if in Washington, Colombia will send Enrique Cortes, former minister of foreign affairs, and who went to Washington in June, 1905, as a special representative of President Reyes, to act as its plenipotentiary, Mr. Mendoza being in the meantime granted leave of absence or transferred. 7. The whole question is to be treated as confidential (not even made known to Mr. Mendoza), except as Colombia may telegraph her delegates at Rio Janeiro about the time the Pan American conference assembles, to the effect that preliminary negotiations are begun which will lead to a satisfactory adjustment of all questions at issue over Panama between Colombia and the United States. In regard to receiving some word from you before the Pan American conference, the President emphasized, in response to my intimation that this suggestion might be misunderstood, that it was in no sense whatever a threat to the effect that Colombia's delegates might in some way bring up the Panama or new republic questions at the conference or quietly approve of its being done by others in the event no favorable answer came from Washington; on the other hand, the delegates of Colombia desired the assurance so as to be able to definitely frustrate any attempt of the kind among other delegates and to remove all cause of suspicion and intrigue based on false reports or jealousy of the United States. The President added that he showed his frankness and fair dealing with me and the United States by informing me that efforts had been made and were being made to have him sanction or assist a movement against the United States in the conference. In conclusion I would state that my conference with President Reyes and Dr. Calderon extended over several hours. It was characterized with the greatest frankness and friendliness of discussion. Both the President and minister of foreign affairs seemed deeply interested in the subject and most anxious that you and President Roosevelt should appreciate and reciprocate their sincerity of purpose. They were good enough to say that my attitude and policy as minister here had paved the way to their determination to seek a settlement on a new basis of the Panama question and to lay their complete plans in confidence before me for submission to you and President Roosevelt. In view of its confidential and highly important character, I am marking the dispatch "Confidential" and giving it no number. There is not time to prepare and confirm the telegram I shall send on this subject before the mail closes. I have the honor to be, sir, Your obedient servant, JOHN BARRETT. |